


Sounds Good To Me

by ScotlandEvander



Series: Various States [21]
Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV), Captain America (Movies), Iron Man (Movies), Marvel (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers - Ambiguous Fandom
Genre: Avengers: Age of Ultron (Movie) Spoilers, Established Relationship, Gen, Homecoming, M/M, Post-Avengers: Age of Ultron (Movie), Returning Home, Tony Stark Has Issues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-05
Updated: 2016-06-05
Packaged: 2018-07-12 08:43:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,469
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7094704
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ScotlandEvander/pseuds/ScotlandEvander
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Loki comes homes, Steve finds out what Bucky's been up to for the past year, and Tony thinks.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sounds Good To Me

**_Disclaimer: If you know it, I do not own it._ **

* * *

 

_That’s the way that it goes / Everybody’s buying baby clothes / That’s the way it ends / There was a time when I thought he and I were friends_

_-Gillian Welch, “The Way It Goes”_

* * *

Tony peeled out of the gravel driveway (to get that old world country feel) and headed towards the paved road that’d take him back to the open highway.

“FRIDAY, turn the music up. Driving music,” he instructed. He was looking forward to the mind clearing drive home. He wasn’t all that sure why he’d driven up to visit. Okay. Fine. He missed being an Avenger. He would miss it. Did miss it?

Oh, introspection was so bad for him.

Pepper wanted him out of the superhero business. She wasn’t happy, so he wasn’t happy. And now with flying Vision man, they didn’t really need him. Plus, they’d gotten War Machine—somehow. Didn’t Rhodney have, like, military commitments? He was always telling Tony he couldn’t do things because the _AIR FORCE_ sent him to some horrible desert location without reliable internet. Or they were doing something else stupid. Like paperwork. Or mandatory fun.

And that was totally a thing the Air Force did: Mandatory Fun.

“You cannot bring world peace by yourself, you idiot!” Pepper had screamed at him when she’d heard the whole story. “I’m not sure you can tell the difference between destroying the world and saving it!”

At least she had listened to his side of the story before yelling at him.

Then didn’t speak to him for a whole week till he told her about building an Avenger headquarters far away from his own home and taking a break. While he felt a little bad kicking out Natasha and Steve, he built them killer suites at the new headquarters. Steve loved his. Tony wasn’t sure if Natasha had decided to feel anything yet about anything. She might never feel again.

Thanks a lot, Bruce.

Dumb Bruce.

Tony was pissed his science brother had fled. 

“STOP!”

He wasn’t sure why he’d screamed, as he was more than able to hit the break peddle, but FRIDAY brought his Audi to a screeching halt and the guy who was walking along side the road looked up, taking in the orange car before he smirked.

“Stark,” a familiar voice greeted as Tony fell out of the car, almost forgetting to take his seatbelt off in his haste.

“LOKI!”

Tony walked up and slugged the guy as hard as he could in the arm.

“WHAT THE HELL!”

Loki appeared bewildered, though Tony couldn’t see his eyes through the super dark sunglasses covering those stupid eyes Steve STILL waxed on about when he thought no one was around. It wasn’t even all that sunny. Though, it’d been sunny till Tony had left. It was like the moment Steve Rogers had gone inside in all his perfect glory, the clouds moved in.

“WHERE THE HELL HAVE YOU BEEN AND WHAT THE HELL DID YOU BRIBE JARVIS WITH SO HE WOULDN’T TELL ME?”

Loki cocked his head to the side.

“I did not bribe JARVIS with anything. I told Steve where I was going. It is not my fault he didn’t either believe me or JARVIS was unable to find the playground.”

“You were at a playground for the past year?” Tony doubtfully asked.

“Not a playground, the Playground. It’s what the SHILED HQ is called. Do not ask me why.”

Tony blinked several times behind his own sunglasses. (His were rose tinted, ha ha ha.)

“You’re back?”

“If he will take me back. If not, I shall go back to where I came.”

“Asgard?”

“No, the Playground.”

“Seriously? That’s what Coulson decided to call it?”

“No. I believe that was what it was always called. I am unsure who named it, but it was not Coulson.”

“Whatever. You gonna be an Avenger? That’s what Steve’s all about these days. He’s training a new team now.”

Loki cocked his head the other way.

“Why are you blond?”

“So no one would know it was me. It seems to have failed, as you recognized me.”

“I’m a genius.”

“Are you now?”

“Always.”

Loki sighed, turning away from Tony. “Did you learn nothing, Stark?”

“Did you?”

“I learned to accept myself and all my faults,” Loki replied, bringing up his left hand, which was incased in a black leather glove.

In the middle of summer.

“What gives with the gloves?” Tony asked to avoid answering Loki’s original question.

Loki turned away from Tony, holding his hand out in front of him like Wanda did before she shot red stuff out. The No Longer Wizard flicked his wrist and the glove split in two and moved towards his wrist, snapping to his wrist before ice shot out of his hand and froze a tree next to the road around the trunk in the shape of a very iconic skirt that flew up over a subway grate. Loki flicked his wrist again and the glove replaced itself on his blue hand.

His hand was freaking blue!

“What the hell?!”

“I’ve been transformed,” Loki drawled. “And I am sure more will follow, as the substance that caused this fell into the ocean.”

Tony stared at him with wide eyes.

“Is that why you’ve come back? Because we’re going to be a shit load of trouble because you threw something dangerous in the ocean.”

“I did not throw the objects in the ocean,” Loki corrected, looking furious. “I was elsewhere on the ship fighting other Inhumans when Agent Johnson was left little choice in order to prevent something much worse from occurring.”

“Inhumans?”

“Enhanced humans. Some of them wish to be called Inhumans, as they believe they are not humans or enhanced, but another species.”

Tony blinked. “What?”

“No, I did not return due to them,” Loki blithely went on, fixing the cuff of his shirt. “It was time. Running away is never the solution, hiding is never the answer, and accepting who I am has shown me I’ve gone about this all wrong. I missed him.”

“He misses you like whoa to the point it’s annoying,” Tony groused. “Seriously, if Pepper ran away on me, I don’t think I’d still be hung up a year later.”

Loki didn’t look pleased, but he didn’t look happy either. Tony folded his arms across his chest and moved his feet to be a little wider apart. He stuck his chin out and stared Loki down.

“So, you came home because you missed him?” Tony challenged. “Nothing else?”

“He is home,” Loki answered. “Though, I did miss you greatly, Stark.”

“You did not.”

Loki shrugged.

“Steve’s home and you ran away from home.”

“I did,” Loki replied. “Are you going to deny it was easier for him once I had left?”

“No. I won’t. The press let up once you’d buggered off, so Steve could go wandering in his depression through Brooklyn again. Then you went and sold a shit load of Birkin bags that you STOLE FROM ME.”

“Yes, wondrously kind of me, was it not? I built some minor goodwill for myself and allowed you to take some tax breaks,” Loki said, tugging on his sleeves.

“How did you turn blue?”

“Transmutation,” Loki replied. “I’m nothing now. Not fully human, not fully Inhuman. I’m something else all together. Brilliant, right?”

Tony waved his finger at Loki. “Are you speaking English?”

“Yes. What happened to JARVIS?”

“Oh. Uh…he’s decommissioned.”

“Why?”

“I lost him.”

“You lost him?”

“Yeah, your ears not working? Something happened when I was trying to upload him—”

Tony stopped talking.

“You built another robot?” Loki seethed, the air going several degrees colder. Tony took several steps backwards and put his hands in front of him.

“What? No! Ultron built the body after mind controlling our doctor who is a pioneer in skin regrowing!”

Loki mouthed those last words and shook his head. The air slowly warmed.

“Then we stole the body and the Mind Gem—”

“Mind Gem?”

Tony smirked. “You didn’t know what you had?”

“THANOS GAVE ME THE MIND GEM?!”

Loki’s sunglasses flew off his head and ice shot of his hands and feet, making Tony leap back in order not to get iced. Tony stared at Loki with wide eyes and tried not to scream when he saw the bright red eyes glaring at him. Loki’s shoes snapped back into place, making Tony realize his feet were blue.

“You shoot ice out of your feet?”

“I had the MIND GEM?”

“Yeah. How did you think you were controlling people? Magic?”

“Yes, actually. I knew the stone in the scepter was something magical, connected to the Tesseract in some sense, but I did not realize it was an Infinity Stone itself.”

“Yeah, what are those? Thor mentioned them before he went home.”

“Thor went back to Asgard? He’s no longer here?”

“You just missed him.”

Loki looked upset by this, but shook it off as he went hunting for his Ray-Bans along side the road.

“You didn’t know?”

“No. I know the Tesseract and the Aether are Infinity Gems, but I had failed to realize I had the Mind Gem.”

“What was the Tesseract?”

“The Space Stone,” Loki replied, bending over and picking up his sunglasses. He slid them on. “The Aether is the Reality Stone. Jessica picked up the Time Stone from somewhere, as she time traveled…to protect James Barnes.”

“Yeah, that was just freaky. Where did she get it?”

“I’ve no idea. Not from Thanos. He only had possession of one when I knew him, and didn’t share the information with me.”

“Why would he? If Crazy Loki had known what he had, would he have done as he did?”

“Likely not,” Loki admitted. “Though, maybe? I was under the influence of the Mind Gem.” 

Tony’s head hurt. “Thor seems to think that someone, likely Thanos, is after all of them to put them together and has been moving us all like pup—chess pieces. Your dad’s got some sort of glove, right? That they fit into?”

Loki stood as still as the unmoving trees surrounding them.

“Oh.”

“What?”

“There are two Gauntlets,” Loki realized. “Odin has one in his vault. I’d bet my hair that Thanos has a second one.”

“Why would there be two?”

“Most creatures have two hands.”

“But six stones. Wouldn’t all the stones be in one glove in order to work together? I mean, that’s what they do, right? Work well together to be a super power? That’s why your Not Daddy sent the stuff you needed my arc reactor for to someone else, right?”

“How did you know that?”

“I asked Jane,” Tony said. At Loki’s doubtful look, he added, “I do talk to her. No one told me I’m not allowed to. I like her, okay? She’s really smart. I mean, I don’t like her, like her. I just like her as a person. I don’t want to—”

“Shut up.”

Tony snapped his mouth shut.

“Odin sent it to the Collector. He collects things of power,” Loki muttered. “As does Odin, hence his weapons fault filled with stolen relics.”

“Who’d he steal the Gauntlet from?”

“No idea. When I inquired what it was as a child he said it was a glove of power. When Thor and I told him we were worried Thanos was after it, he informed us it was a glove of no power unless filled with stones of power, which he lamented he had only one.”

“So, without Infinity Gems, it’s just a glove?”

“A big, golden, ugly glove that weighs a metric ton,” Loki grumbled.

“You picked it up?”

“Of course I did. It was the only item Odin allowed Thor and I to handle in the vault until he bestowed Mjolnir upon Thor.” 

“Who he’d steal that from?”

“No one, actually. Odin ordered some dwarves to create him a magical weapon for his son upon Thor’s birth. They foraged Mjolnir in the heart of dying star. Odin kept it within the vault until Thor came of age.”

“And he’s had it ever since?”

“Except for those three days he was upon Earth as a mortal,” Loki replied.

“And it really only allows those worthy of its power to wield it?”

“Correct. I’ve never been able to lift it.”

Tony cursed lowly and whistled.

“What?”

“Vision, the robot body that Ultron built for himself that we stole and tried to upload JARVIS into, picked the hammer up like five-seconds after he woke up after Thor used the hammer to hammer him to life.”

Loki swayed a little as if there was a breeze.

“I seem to have missed quite a lot of excitement whilst I was holidaying in China,” Loki muttered, turning around and marching off.

“Where are you going? And what the hell were you doing on holiday in China! I thought you ran off to become an agent of SHILED?”

Lok whirled around. “Vision, that’s what you called him?”

“That’s kind of what he calls himself. I’m not too clear how he wound up calling himself that. I mean, Thor had a vision about him, hence why he flew in and bashed his hammer into the case holding the robot body made out of the same metal that Steve’s shield is made out—”

“Pardon?”

“Ultron found a guy who stole a lot of vibranium from Wakanda.”

Loki cocked his head to the side.

“It’s a long story, but it’s a special metal and this guy is made out of it, okay? Just roll with it. He also loves your brother and thinks he’s awesome, as he was looking at Thor’s cape and made himself one.”

“Made himself one?”

“Yeah, he’s the holder of the Mind Gem. Thor says he’s worthy because he picked the hammer up. A few times.”

Loki sat down hard on the ground. Tony closed the distance between them, but didn’t join Loki on the ground, as he didn’t feel like getting dirt all over his butt.

“Steve can lift it. He pretended not to be able to, but I saw the wobble and Thor’s face,” Tony offered. “We were all at various stages of happily buzzed after our Yay-We-Got-The-Glow-Stick party. Thor was drinking his special mead, which he shared with Steve.”

“Didn’t do anything to him, did it?”

“Nope. Pretty sure Steve was our DD.”

Loki snorted.

“Not that it really mattered as our party was crashed by a robot hell bent on bringing the end of days.”

Loki sighed. “Stark—”

“Tony. Please, why the hell won’t you call me Tony? It’s bad enough Steve refuses to call me Tony.”

“Anthony,” Loki began again and Tony sighed deeply. “Did you really learn nothing from Ultron?”

“Don’t create a peace-keeping AI to take over for the Avengers?”

Loki sighed deeply, getting to his feet and brushing himself off. “You really are the stupidest genius I’ve ever met.”

“Hey!”

“Goodbye, Anthony,” Loki called, waving over his shoulder as he went back to walking away from Tony.

“I learned plenty!”

Tony grumbled as he got back into his car and started it back up. He floored it and tore down the road. It wasn’t until he was sitting in traffic on his way into the city did he realize Loki was kind of right.

He’d made Ultron and when presented with another robot body, instead of destroying it like Bruce wanted (or just waiting for Thor to come back and do something with the magical thinking stone), his first thought was to give the body to the battle worn JARVIS.

Granted, he didn’t think JARVIS would wind up an AI with a God complex to make Insane Loki look perfectly docile and logical. JARVIS was…JARVIS.

Okay, he was Jarvis. In almost every sense other than he was an AI, had no body, and for a long time didn’t understand sarcasm, he was just like the Edwin Jarvis Tony remembered from his childhood. The guy who told him stories about running around with Peggy Carter saving the world. 

He could have had that. He and JARVIS could have worked together to save the world. Instead, JARVIS was gone for good and all that was left was Vision, who sounded like JARVIS but was not JARVIS.

Tony missed JARVIS. Waking up each day to FRIDAY’s voice was jarring and kind of sucky. While he knew he could reprogram FRIDAY and make her into JARVIS, it felt wrong. JARVIS was gone. Who the AI had been was gone.

Tony had to start over.

Just like he had to rebuild Dummy, You, and Butterfingers after his house fell into the ocean, he now had to rebuild his personal AI. Granted, it was easy to rebuild Dummy, You, and Butterfingers because he’d had JARVIS pack-up their programs. So he had to just rebuild the physical then upload the personality.

It still sucked, though he was finally able to upgrade Dummy. Dummy hated upgrades, but with him out of commission, he had no say in his new case. And didn’t even notice, the idiot.

Tony swallowed, not minding the fact he was sitting in bumper to bumper traffic going nowhere.

“There needs to be someone to stop me, someone who is not afraid of me,” Tony whispered.

Usually, this person was Pepper or Bruce.

Bruce had not wanted to go along with him, but he had helped him. At first grudgingly, but he got into it near the end of the three days they had with the scepter. Maybe if he’d had more time— no. It’d still have wound up a total disaster. Tony rested his forehead against the steering wheel.

Ultron was how he was because of Tony’s personal flaws. Steve had remarked the guy had had a major God complex. Tony agreed. It went passed all his Biblical references to how he wanted to shape the world over again (so had that freaky Elf guy, though he wanted to plunge the whole universe into darkness and start over). No, the God complex was rooted in wanting to fix everything, wanting to right the wrongs. It was not just bringing peace.

Tony let out a shaky laugh.

Tony wanted to fix the world, wanted to right all he wrongs he’d created through making weapons for so many years. And the only reason Tony didn’t do it the way Ultron had wanted?

He was human and did not want to die. He did not want other humans to die in order to correct his wrongs.

Ultron, not being human and not understanding or wanting to understand the human condition, went about “fixing” the world by ridding it of the problem: humans.

Tony sat up.

There needed to be checks and balances. Someone, since SHIELD was technically gone (and illegal) needed to keep all the Enhanced Humans and Superheroes in check. There needed to be someone to answer to when things went wrong.

Currently, Tony had no one to answer to except himself. Clearly, that didn’t work.

Taking a deep breath, he gripped the steering wheel and slowly moved forward with traffic.

* * *

_I want to wear a crown of glory / When I get home to that good land / I want to shout salvation’s story / In concert with the blood-washed band_

_-Neil Young, “Wayfarin’ Stranger”_

* * *

Loki came to a halt at what he assumed was the front door. He looked around, taking note of the various cameras. He didn’t have to wait long before Fury appeared, propping the door open and leaning against it as if he was casually waiting for pizza.

“It was open,” he said, smirking at Loki. “Pretty sure he’s hopeful you’ll just walk on in and join him.”

“He’s not that—” Loki stopped, knowing Steven would leave the door unlocked, for him or Sebastian.

“You know I’m right,” Fury taunted, stepping aside for Loki to enter. “He’s running the newbies through the paces.”

Fury raised an eyebrow.

“I’m not here to join,” Loki claimed.

“Sure. I’ve got shit to do. Find your own way,” Fury groused and left Loki alone in the hallway.

Loki remained where he was till he heard the noise of training and crept towards it. The door was partly open, so Loki pushed it open further to see inside the room. He looked around the large, open room, taking in the glass wall that was typical Stark fashion. He turned his eyes to the people within the room and watched for a moment. Everyone other than Natasha and Steven could fly. It made for rather interesting training sequences.

“Okay! Everyone stop!”

Everyone landed and Natasha picked herself off the floor. Loki watched with rapt attention as the one called Vision landed near the girl with the red magic.

It was magic. Loki could smell it.

“Let’s take ten,” Steven suggested, itching his ear and throwing his shield onto his back. “We got a lot of work to do.”

“Correct,” Vision agreed using JARVIS’s voice.

Well, that was unnerving.

“Any insights?” Steven inquired.

“Many, but there is someone at the door for you.”

Loki straightened up from where he was peeking through the half opened door as Steven whirled around.

“Loki?”

Loki pulled the door shut and backed against the wall.

The full gaze of those blue eyes was unnerving. How had he forgotten how blue those eyes were? How full of emotion? How lovely…

The door flew open and suddenly Steven was there, within touching distance. Steven gaped, eating Loki up greedily with his eyes till he reached his face.

“Why are you wearing sunglasses? You hate people who wear sunglasses inside,” Steven remarked, frowning deeply.

Loki cleared his throat, but did not stop pressing his back into the wall. “Is there somewhere we can go to speak? I…do not wish to do so in the hallway.”

“Yeah, uh, let me…” Steven jerked this thumb over his shoulder.

“Go. I got this, Steve,” Natasha said from behind the close door.

Steven groaned, but reached out and grabbed Loki by the arm and towed him off. Loki didn’t pay attention to where Steven was taking him as Loki was on overload from Steven simply grabbing his arm. Not even his bare arm, as there was a layer of cotton between Loki’s skin and Steven’s. 

“Where have you been?” Steven hissed as he wove his way through hallways till he reached an elevator. He jammed his finger into the button multiple times as if that would make the lift arrive faster.

“Here and there. I spent some time in China and somewhere in the Pacific Ocean for a bit. It started out lovely, ended rather horridly.”

Steven glanced at him before looking back at his finger jamming into the call button. He gripped Loki tightly as if he was afraid if he let go, Loki would vanish into nothingness. Since Loki had run away from Steven and Steven had done nothing to stop him, Loki did not blame him or complain for being held hostage.

“Why were you in China?”

“Not here.”

Steven pressed his lips into a thin line, but nodded.

“We’re going to my quarters,” Steve said. “My apartment. Home?”

Steven glanced at Loki out of the corner of his eye, his hopefulness shining through.

“Home,” Loki agreed. “If I am allowed to join you…”

Steven turned to face Loki and said with a very serious face, “Don’t get me wrong, Loki Laufey-Odinson—”

“Loki Friggason,” Loki corrected. “Or maybe Loki Odin-Friggason, but that’s a little obvious. Everyone knows the connection to Odin, but no one really knows my mother’s name was Frigga, as her name was left out of all the SHIELD reports. The myths are all over the place with who Thor’s real mother happens to be, so—”

“You changed your name?”

“Recently, yes. Also, that other name was really a mouthful.”

Steve said nothing in response as the elevator dinged open and he dragged Loki inside. The doors shut and Steven stood in tense silence as it rose.

“You live at the top?”

“Yes. Stark built two apartments on top for the team leaders. Natasha has the other one.”

The elevator door opened and Steven dragged him down the hall a bit to a door with a shield hanging on it. Steven opened the door and towed Loki inside. Loki’s jaw dropped. He slowly turned in a slow circle.

“This looks almost exactly like our apartment in New York,” Loki breathed.

“Only with stairs,” Steven said, indicating to the stairs that led upwards to another level. “And more windows. Stark loves windows.”

“But these are all our belongings,” Loki went on. “Well, the things the government didn’t cease.”

“Stark got the important things,” Steven said quietly. “It was weird being here without you, though.”

“So, you don’t live here?”

“No. I do.”

Loki stepped further into the apartment and saw signs of life. He trailed his hand over his beloved couch, then smiled at the mismatched but painted to match dining room chairs. His heart felt full.

“I know we gotta talk, and trust me we will, but Loki…”

Loki whirled around and found Steven right behind him. Loki tense, thinking Steven was going to punch him in the nose for running off, but instead he got a bone brushing (and Loki meant bone crushing) hug. Loki returned it the best he could, sucking in Steven’s scent (which granted wasn’t at his best, but Loki still loved the stench of Sweat-Drenched-Still-in-Suit-Smelling-Steven as much as just from the Shower-Smelling-Steven or I-Remembered-To-Put-Cologne-On-Steven).

Steven wetly laughed, pressing his face into Loki’s shoulder.

“What?” Loki inquired.

Loki would have liked to pull away to be able to see his face, but Steven did not relinquish his grip.

“Natasha asked earlier today what I’d do if you showed up. I told her I’d hug you to death,” Steven choked out and laughed harder. He loosened his grip and started to go down. Loki tried to catch him, but the super solider weighed almost twice as much as Loki now that Loki was no longer a dense Frost Giant, so he took Loki with him. They wound up in a heap on the floor, Loki sprawled over Steven as he awkwardly lay on the ground, his shield still strapped to his back. “Oh my gosh.”

“Sorry,” Loki apologized, trying to scramble off Steven, but Steven grabbed him and crushed him to his chest once more.

“You are not going anywhere any time soon, mister.”

Loki pressed his face into Steven’s chest and muttered, “I’d rather be nowhere else.”

* * *

_Don’t know what to do without you / Don’t know what to do with you / Used to look at you with wonder / Now I look at you and wonder_

_-Ben Harper & Charlie Musselwhite, “I Don’t Believe a Word You Say” _

* * *

“So. You killed people?”

“They weren’t very nice.”

“Did you do it on purpose?”

“Not always.”

Steve hated he couldn’t tell if Loki was lying. Killing things was on the top of his list of reason why he ran off in the first place.

Also smashing, but killing was always mentioned first.

“Most of the people killed were HYDRA. I am sure you’ve killed your fair share of HYDRA.”

Steve shifted. “I never wanted to kill them. Mostly just knock them out.”

Loki smiled fondly at Steve before looking out the window again. The sunglasses had fallen off some point during Steve’s attempts to hug-crush him. Loki’s eyes were now red— a wondrous shade of red that went between ruby and red apple. Loki admitted his hair was now naturally white and had shown Steve his blue hands and feet. Upon seeing Steve’s reaction, he ditched the gloves and his shoes (he preferred to be barefoot now) and curled into himself on the couch to finish telling Steve the tale of how he wound up with blue hands and feet, red eyes, and white hair. Loki had told him how the whole ordeal steamed from the serum Daisy (who used to be Skye), Jim, and Loki were all given.

Moral: there were more aliens. And they’d ran experiments on humans to make super soldiers during a massive war.

Of course they did. It’s what people (human or alien) did.

Steve was seated on the opposite end of the couch from Loki, Loki’s cold feet tucked under Steve’s thigh. Steve kept running his fingers over the exposed blue skin, which felt just like the Frost Giant skin, only without the raised designs.

“There was more fighting and knocking out than killing,” Loki admitted. “I trained James.”

“Jim Nicholls?”

Loki nodded. “He became an agent right before SHEILD went under and remained once Coulson chose to rebuild. He was rather untrained when I arrived and no one wished tutor the poor boy.”

“Because of his…drawing weird alien writing without knowing what he was doing. Yeah, I guess that’d freak some people out.”

“You are taking this better than I expected.”

“I kept track of you via JARVIS. While I can’t find the Playground, I know that was the main base SHEILD was using. JARVIS would tell me when you’d be out on missions, who you were with, and when you’d return. I know he told you the same for me.”

Loki nodded.

“He did not tell me about…you changing passed something had happened to you and it was the reason you’d gone off grid. And now I get why he didn’t tell me.”

“Director Coulson wiped it from our records, the safe haven where the Inhumans used to go,” Loki admitted. “And no one can get there anymore.”

He got a far away look on his face. Steve moved onto another topic. “So, Coulson’s trying to work with the government?”

“With the US Air Force. Oddly, it was the Air Force that showed up at the Hub after I left to bring the remains of SHIELD in, so Coulson works through the guy who was leading the charge, General Tablot.”

“An Air Force general went into battle?”

“I know, strange. But, it was highly unlikely Coulson was going to attack.”

“Oh, I don’t know. He’s rather slippery.”

Loki snorted, resting his head on the arm of the sofa.

“So, uh, did you find what you went looking for?” Steve asked.

Loki looked up and met his eyes. He looked rather scared he’d see something different in Steve’s face than he usually did, but Steve didn’t really care those green eyes were gone. They were still Loki’s eyes, just a different color. (Though it was kind of strange Loki was blonde now. But, Steve wasn’t going to tell him that.)

“I did. Am finally at peace with who and what I am,” Loki divulged quietly. He looked away and gazed back out the huge windows that lined the wall of the apartment. They had none of the architectural charm their apartment’s large window’s had, but they did let in plenty of natural light and showcase the open space Northern New York had to offer. 

“Okay, I forgive the manner you left me behind.”

Loki turned back to him, his ruby eyes large and wet. “I do not deserve you.”

Steve hitched up one side of his mouth. “You might not deserve me, but I want you.”

Loki blinked furiously. Steve let go of Loki’s foot and attacked him with a hug again. He held on at tightly as he dared, even if it was an awkward angle and he was likely squishing the poor guy into the sofa arm.

“You’re gonna have to talk to Sam. He and Natasha got the brunt of my anger at you running off and be not being able to follow.”

“I am so sorry, but—”

“You had to go. I know. You were mad, angry, and trapped. You’ve been that before and things kind of blew up in your face in a matter of three days,” Steve quietly said, resting his chin on the top of Loki’s head. “At least you used your negative emotions for something constructive, right?”

“I should hope, but am unsure.”

“Why?”

“I worry about what will become of them,” Loki admitted pulling away. “Agent Simmons was taken by an alien artifact shortly after we…settled the Inhuman matter.”

“What?” Steve asked, wracking his mind for which one was Simmons.

“SHEILD had been transporting this huge alien stone somewhere when it fell and the aircraft carrier it was on remained in SHEILD friendly hands.”

“SHEILD friendly hands?”

“Well, the people on that boat started the other fraction of SHIELD that was working against Coulson, as they didn’t believe he ought to be in charge of the new SHIELD and Fury had no right to choose the director without consulting the…Well, I guess the other high ranking SHEILD officers who weren’t HYDRA.”

Steve snorted. “Bureaucrats.”

“Yes, well, I think they’ve solved that problem after the Inhuman fraction tried to start a war. We were wrapping up our business when…I’m not sure what happened, but the stone goes liquid every now and then. It went liquid and grabbed Simmons as somehow the door had become unlocked. It’s kept in a case.”

“You didn’t know what it was?”

“No. I’ve never felt so useless. I want to help Fitz so badly, but there is nothing I am able to do.”

“Really?”

Loki shook his head, moving out of Steve’s arms. Steve backed up a little. “I cannot go to Asgard and no one has returned my calls.”

“You’ve been calling?”

“Yes. They’re not answering. I was kind of hoping they’d send Sif down with what materials might aid us in discovering what the thing is, but…”

“I’m sorry.”

Steve squeezed Loki’s hand.

“The artifact’s history isn’t clear. SHILED had almost nothing of worth on it.”

“So, what are you going to do to help Fitz?”

“Research. But, I do not need to be there to do so and…I missed you. It was time to return home.”

“Thanks,” Steve said, squeezing his hand again. “Remember, you’re going to have to speak with Sam and Nat. Did you happen across Tony on your way in?”

“Yes, he almost ran me over before he noticed me,” Loki smirked.

“Of course he did. So you talked?”

“Yes. He’s the same.”

“I know.”

“He didn’t learn anything,” Loki quietly said. “Where is Bruce?”

Steve made a face.

“What happened?”

“He ran away.”

Loki looked confused for a second before he looked heartbroken. “He’s not here?”

“No. But, he’ll come back. Just like you. You can’t run away from home forever, now can you?”

“No. How is your search for James going?”

“You mean Bucky right? Not Jim?”

“I’ve no idea why you would be looking for Agent Nicholls over your long thought dead friend.”

Steve rolled his eyes. “You can just call him Bucky.”

Loki raised an eyebrow in distaste. “No. I think not.”

Steve sighed. “We’ve had a few leads, but we always seem to just miss him. Sam’s been doing most of the looking, as I’ve been busy. Nat’s gone a couple times on her own when Sam and I were both busy, but now we’re all here, though.”

“Samuel’s going to be an Avenger?” Loki asked, perking up.

“Yup,” Steve popped out. “Falcon, the Vision, War Machine, and Scarlet Witch— who you need to meet ASAP.”

“She’s the young woman with the red magic?”

“Is it magic? We thought it was visible energy.”

“It smells of magic, which makes sense due to being brought out by the Mind Gem.”

Steve smirked. “Tony tell you about that?”

“Yes. I cannot believe I had the Mind Gem and I threw it away.”

“You didn’t know, plus from what both the Vision and Thor have said, those gems are dangerous.”

“They are. I had two. I only realized, I was in possession of two and I threw both away.”

“To get free of their hold. I’ve seen nothing good come from being in possession of either. Well, except the Vision. He seems to be okay,” Steve admitted. “I think Thor’s right he’s the only thing that should have that gem.”

“Because he can wield Mjinlor?”

“Yeah, but he seems to get it and he doesn’t use it to mind control people,” Steve teased, poking Loki in the side he knew was ticklish. “So, we’ve got a war to get ready for.”

“Really, Steven? You see one brewing?”

“Thanos. Thor had a vision, two actually. He, uh, when Wanda mind zapped him before she was a friendly, Thor saw…I’m not sure but whatever it was stuck with him longer than our visions stuck with us.”

Steve suppressed a shiver. He looked at Loki to find the ruby eyes reading him easily. Steve closed his own eyes and sighed deeply.

“What did you see?”

“A confused version of what home was to me,” Steve replied, rubbing the back of his neck and scowling at the floor. Loki took his chin and gently tilted Steve’s face up. “It was right after the war ended. The visions were supposed to show us our greatest fears, okay? My fear…is war never really ending, my own PTSD.”

Steve felt like a huge weight was lifted off his chest admitting that.

“The loss of home,” he went on, gazing into the gem colored eyes that were his to drink in whenever he wanted now that they’d returned to him willingly. “I was in a dance hall, like the ones from before the war Bucky and I went to, only Bucky wasn’t there. They were people I didn’t know, all in various stages of injury, yet they were laughing and having a ball. Everything was red, the room drenched in red light. I was in the middle of the floor and Peggy showed up, dressed as I’d never seen her. She was literally the only uninjured person in the hall other than me. She asked for a dance, but when I didn’t move she said we could go home. Only, I knew I wasn’t able to go home because you were lying dead on the floor.”

“Oh, Steven,” Loki whispered, raising his hand and stroking Steve’s cheek.

Steve swallowed thickly. “Then, the whole hall was void of people and I was all alone. Left behind.”

Loki’s eyes looked heart broken, so Steve forced himself to smile.

“It could have been worse. Wanda admitted to giving Stark a vision when he was in von Strucker’s lab standing before the scepter. She didn’t want, well, what happened. She only wanted him to take it and use it to tear us apart, to make him our enemy. She didn’t realize he’d take that fear and build Ultron.”

“She didn’t know him very well, then, even after looking in his head,” Loki remarked. “That is what she does, isn’t it?”

Steve nodded. “You can’t tell she’s doing it except the look on her face. It’s honestly a bit…unnerving.”

“Yes, those talented in the mind arts are almost always feared above all others,” Loki quietly said. Loki yawned, trying to cover it with a long-fingered hand.

God, Steve missed those hands.

“I shall like to meet her,” Loki commented. “How is she doing training wise?”

“Physically, she’s a little rusty, but young. Her powers? I’ve no idea. The Vision is working with her. She really likes him, always has.”

“I bet she found his mind beautiful when he started,” Loki remarked. “It was unblemished by race, sex, or anything. Likely filled with simple wonder.”

“I never thought of that.”

“The world was new and an amazing thing to him,” Loki suggested. “It was after seeing what was in Ultron’s mind she and her brother turned on him, correct?”

“Yes. They said they saw what he really was doing, what his final goal was and didn’t agree. She later told me she never meant for this to happen to the scale it did.”

“Never underestimate the size of Stark’s ego.”

“Or yours. After we’d figured out what had happened, I shuddered to think what she’d have done to you if you’d been with us.”

“Did she get Clint?”

“No,” Steve breathed. “He was the only one. He got her.”

Loki smirked and Steve pounced.

Later, when the sweat was cooling on both their skins and the sheets were a tangled mess, Steve gripped Loki hard enough to bruise his pale skin and said, “Don’t you ever run away on me again.”

Loki slipped his hand into Steve’s hair gently and said, “I do not plan to unless you tell me to leave.”

Steve swallowed, wanting to believe him but only time would tell if Loki could earn that trust back. He settled down in bed and listened to Loki breath while Loki listened to Steve’s heart. He must have fallen asleep as the next thing he knew his phone was blasting the loudest, most annoying noise known to man. Loki grumbled, rolling away. Steve rolled towards the nightstand where his phone was shouting, “HEAVEY BOOTS OF LEAD FILL HIS VICTIMS FULL OF DREAD. RUNNING AS FAST AS THEY CAN IRON MAN LIVES AGAIN!”

Steve finally got the phone and answered, not bothering to see who was calling at such an hour.

“Yeah?” Steve groaned, his voice coming out scratchy from his earlier actives and sleep.

“I think he’s been kidnapped. He went to blow up a HYDRA cell almost two months ago. He ditched his phone, I can’t trace his passport because I’m not a computer genius who dabbles in the illegal, and I can’t get a hold of LOKI! He always checks in, he always does. At first I thought it was because he needed a handler to operate, but he told me he does it so someone else knows where he is and to ease my worry. He hasn’t called in almost eight weeks and I can’t get a hold of Loki on his iPhone and he’s not sending any messages via the MacBook.”

It took Steve the whole spiel to figure out it was Jess talking to him.

“Loki,” Steve started, but stopped when he realized Jess thought someone had been kidnapped. “Wait, you think someone’s been kidnapped? Who is not Loki, right?”

Loki shot up so fast Steve was sure someone has shocked him. Loki, wide awake, tried to take the phone, but Steve turned away.

“Jess, who do—”

“BUCKY!”

Steve and Loki both froze, the former’s ruby eyes wide and scared. Steve instantly knew.

“You both knew where Bucky was and didn’t tell me.”

“He didn’t want me to tell you,” Jess wailed.

“He wished for you to not know,” Loki calmly said at the same time.

Steve was livid. He flew out of bed and glared at the man still tangled in the sheets. He pressed the phone hard enough to his ear he likely would have hurt his ear if he’d been normal.

“You knew where he was and just let me chase after ghosts?”

“You were close,” Jess insisted, “but he’s gone! He ditched his phone and he never came home. He always calls. When he lands, he calls, when he finished the job, he calls, when he takes off, he calls. He always calls me, Steve. He hasn’t called in almost eight weeks!”

Jess burst into tears on the other end of the line while Steve glared at Loki.

“You knew. And didn’t tell me.”

“I was unaware he was missing. Jessica would not have been able to get a hold of me because when I transformed, I ruined my iPhone and my MacBook was left behind at one of Bruce’s cabins.”

“STEVE!” Jess wailed. “He’s missing! Stop being mad about the past. Loki and I weren’t supposed to tell you. It was Sebastian’s wish.”

“Who?”

“Sebastian. Bucky. He wants to be called Sebastian. He made a choice and I had to respect it. It was all part of him becoming a person, one who made choices.”

Steve turned away from Loki and heaved a few deep breaths. He lowered the phone, letting it hang loosely at his side.

“You sent him on missions, knowing what he’d been through?”

“Judging by the trail he blazed to Alaska, I believed he would not mind taking out HYDRA bases,” Loki gently said. “He informed me that the one in Thailand was his last one and he was through after this. I assumed he was getting himself together enough to come here to see you. I had hoped he’d already made contact.”

“He was planning on coming here?” Steve asked, then realized he needed to ask Jess, so he put the phone back to his ear. “After the last mission, he was going to come here?”

“Told me we’d buy tickets and surprise you once he got home. Only he never came back!”

Steve had too many emotions flowing through him to do anything other than breathe.

“We were going to fly to New York and he was going to make apple cake. He perfected it before he left, even made icing for it.”

“He remembers I like apple cake?”

“He remembers Bucky, but he doesn’t like Bucky’s name,” Jess sniffed. “Steve, he’s gone. Something horrible happened if he’s been radio silent this long.”

“And you’re just getting around to calling me?”

“No,” Jess sobbed. “But no one answered or had answers for me. I didn’t want to tell too many people about him, yeah? I tried to get Loki’s details out of Jim, but he didn’t have a number for an iLoki because the idiot didn’t make himself one after he ruined his iPhone. And your iLoki isn’t in service, so I hope to god your StarkPhone isn’t being hacked right now.”

Loki cocked his head to the side. Steve wasn’t sure how he could hear Jess, as Steve was huddled on the other side of the room turned away from him, but it was clear Loki could hear what was being said through the tiny phone speaker. Steve turned further away and pushed the phone closer to his ear.

(He had trashed his iLoki ten hours after Loki left in a fit of rage. He hadn’t bothered to ask JARVIS to ask Loki to make him a new one.)

“Jess, calm down. Start at the beginning.”

“He likes to bake,” Jess wailed. “I gained like twenty pounds because he made cookies, so many cookies, and cakes. He loves frosting cupcakes. And he found Pinterest. OMG. So many cupcakes. I haven’t had a cupcake in four weeks.”

She began to sob to the point she was unable to talk, so Steve straightened and turned his serious face to Loki.

Loki looked pained, like he wished Steve hadn’t found out about this betrayal, but squared his shoulders and started at the beginning.

“It was before I joined SHIELD, but when I was thinking of it. I thought about randomly going after HYDRA strongholds that were public knowledge, when JARVIS pointed out many organizations were doing that, as well as an unknown who was blazing a trail north taking out what were later declared HYDRA bases that hadn’t been known.”

“Why didn’t JARVIS ever tell us?”

“I ordered him not to,” Loki admitted. “After I left, I investigated what was found at the physical locations on my way to the Playground, as quite a few were on my way.”

Steve checked the phone and found Jess was still sobbing uncontrollably. He began to feel bad as there was no one there to comfort her.

“I made an educated guess the person doing the destruction was the Winter Solider,” Loki went on without emotion. “It was his style. In and out without a trace. It wasn’t like the other HYDRA bases being taken down by the government.”

“Why?”

“These were all burned to the ground. He was literally blazing his way north. I lost track of him somewhere in Canada. He simply vanished.”

“That’s because I brought him to Anchorage,” Jess croaked, sounding as if she was trying to get herself together. She sniffed loudly and blew her nose. “I don’t remember, as I was an orange fire demon, but Seb told me I brought him up here from somewhere in Canada.”

Loki extended his head in agreement.

“How did you know he went to Anchorage?”

“I didn’t know until I followed him to Anchorage after he’d took out a HYDRA base in northern Alaska. I was suspicious as Jessica was talking about this new guy friend she had. She was very careful not to tell me much, like she didn’t really wish for me to know, but was unable to stop herself.”

“Oops,” Jess whispered.

Steve sat heavily on the floor, dropping his phone. Loki slid out of the bed and moved across the room. Each movement was careful, as if Loki thought Steve was a wild animal he didn’t wish to spook. When Loki got close enough, he took the dropped phone and flicked on the speaker.

“Jessica?”

“Loki! Where the hell have you been?”

“Through hell. Not important. We must find Sebastian. He phoned when he was done?”

“No! That’s just it, he never called after he arrived.”

“Well, he blew the base up,” Steve grumbled. “Nat was there. She said it was gone. She also noted there were several other—“

Steve stopped breathing.

“Steven?”

“Steve?”

“Oh, god.”

“WHAT?!” Jess shouted.

“Nat said there were several other groups of unfriendlies. She took out the HYDRA goons, but she thought she’d seen Grant Ward. She wasn’t sure why he’d be there if he wasn’t looking to get the Winter Solider to join him. Also, some government agency that was not the CIA or FBI was lurking around and doing a bad job at blending in.”

“Any of those groups could have gotten him,” Jess wailed.

Loki got to his feet and swiftly went to his bag he’d dumped on the ground hours ago.

Was that only hours ago?

“Tell Steven about Sebastian,” Loki said as he pulled out a laptop. It wasn’t his MacBook, but one that looked similar.

“He likes to bake. He makes cookies and complicated cakes. And he spent weeks trying to master icing cupcakes so they look like the ones you see in those fancy bakeries. He could totally open his own cupcake shop. And he cleans. Like he wipes the house for prints and once he bleached all the carpets.”

“I don’t think you should bleach carpets,” Steve ventured.

“No,” Jess said making a choking noise. “He replaced all the flooring himself. He had so much fun it was too cute to be mad he ruined all the carpet.”

“He likes to be useful,” Steve remembered. He bit his tongue from sharing his own stories of Bucky being overly helpful.

“So that’s Bucky not the Asset? That’s…” Jess trailed off unsure what to say.

“Bucky always wanted to help,” Steve quietly said as Loki tapped the keys of the laptop extra loudly.

“I took him to Kaladi on Muldoon about a week after he showed up, before he discovered cookies and cakes. He didn’t know what to do, so I ordered two different things for him. I did that a lot in the early days. I ordered for him but let him pick between the two things I ordered when they arrived. It was too overwhelming to have too many choices. Anyway, I took him to Kaladi. He picked the caramel latte I kind of really wanted. He took one sip and I thought he was going to short circuit. I knew I’d created a coffee addict when he started going by himself.”

“He went out alone?” Steve whispered while watching Loki bite his lower lip, red eyes flying across his screen.

“Of course. He didn’t just sit in the house all by himself. He even took cooking and baking classes without me after a while. It was good for him. To be his own person.”

“Was he dangerous?”

“Sometimes, but so are all soldiers,” Jess stubbornly replied. 

“Got him,” Loki proclaimed, picking up the laptop and moving closer to Steve. He glanced at Steve before sitting next to him so he could see the screen. “He didn’t use his passport to fly back to Anchorage, but he was in Anchorage and booked a flight to San Francisco. He was there for roughly a week, before he took another flight to Miami. Then he used his passport to fly himself to Eastern Europe. I tracked his passport the entire way through his trip around Europe. He ditched his iLoki in Bangkok, or that’s the last place it was on.”

“Why would he keep using his passport?”

“Because who ever is after him doesn’t know about Sebastian Stan.”

“That’s his name on the passport?”

“Correct. He was trying to send us a message, only I was unable to receive it.”

“Couldn’t they do face recognition?” Jess asked over the line. “Like on the passport. That’s how they kept finding Jason Borne.”

“It wouldn’t show up due to how I coded the photo,” Loki explained. “The anti-terrorist fighters worst nightmare, hence why this and mine is the only passport it’s on.”

Steve gave Loki a dark look.

“Where is this program now?”

“In my iPhone. I didn’t trust it anywhere else.”

“Where is this iPhone?”

Loki reached into his pocket and took out a baggie filled with broken bits of electronics. Steve studied it carefully. He was pretty sure no one could put that back together except Stark or Loki. (Odd, they both were carrying around pieces of broken cell phones.)

“The ice I encased myself within shattered the phone when I unfroze. This was all that was within my pocket that was returned to me. Agent Fitz could not make head or tails of it. I haven’t had the time to see if I could fix it.”

“So it’s just in your head now?”

Loki nodded.

“You won’t abuse it?”

“No. I only created it so I could go places with ease, then Coulson fixed that by giving me a US Embassy passport. After scanning it, no one looks further once it passes as real.”

“Okay.”

“Anyway, with Sebastian using it so often, allowing it to be scanned so often— he was leaving me a trail to follow.”

“Where does it end?” Jess demanded.

“San Francisco. He boarded a plane in Baltimore, which connected in Denver. He might have gotten off in Denver.”

“So two places to scour,” Steve remarked.

“When was this?”

“Two weeks ago.”

Jess let out a shuddering breath. “Why didn’t he get a burner phone and call?”

“I do not know,” Loki gently said.

Steve glared into space. Loki moved away.

“I’m so sorry, Steve,” Jess pleaded. “He didn’t want you to know. He kept telling me he wasn’t Bucky and you wanted Bucky. I had to respect his choice. It was his choice.”

The pleading in Jess’s voice melted Steve’s anger a little.

“It’s fine.”

It wasn’t, but it wasn’t really her fault. He glanced at Loki, who inched further way and looked down at his laptop, his blond hair falling into his face. Steve said his goodbyes to Jess and assured her they’d keep her updated.

“I think we should start in Denver. We ought to take the Scarlet Witch,” Loki suggested quietly once Steve had hung up.

Steve blankly stared at him.

“I don’t know if her powers work that way. I’d say let’s get Thor to ask Heimdall, but Thor left and Heimdall will not answer any call I make.”

Loki looked so bitter and dejected, Steve sighed, and let go of his own anger and jealousy. He looked down at the phone in his lap and rubbed the back of his neck. 

“We’ll go,” Steve promised. “We’ll pound the pavement and see if anyone’s seen him. Has he cut his hair?”

“Yes. He’s rather anal about his hair. He goes to the salon Jessica works at for regular trims.”

Steve laughed. “Bucky was so vain about his hair. Almost more than you.”

“He is in there,” Loki insisted. “He just…traveled a long way to reach there and has become someone else.”

“I’m not sure I’ll be able to call him Sebastian, but…I’ve got more hope now for him…it’s good to know he’s been taken care of and not living on the streets,” Steve admitted grudgingly.“One less thing to…regret about not being able to find him. What did he do when I visited? I think I went up there twice in the last year.”

“He was on HYDRA hunting missions. And it came naturally to him to leave no trace when he left. He did each time he went away. It disturbed Jessica at first because it was like he’d never been there. Though, you must have noticed the new flooring.”

Steve nodded. “I did. I asked her about it and she claimed she knew a guy. She knows so many random people, I figured she did know a guy. I didn’t think this guy was Bucky.”

Loki shrugged.

“You left a bunch of crap behind when you ran off. I didn’t pick any of it up for a month.”

“I am so sorry—”

“Shut up. Let’s get some sleep. I’ll talk to Travel about getting a jet to Denver.”

“Wonderful. Shall I inquire if Ms Maxinoff can be of aid and introduce myself?”

“If you think you can without getting into a fight with her.”

“I’ve not a combative bone in my body.”

Steve snorted.

* * *

_I like you ‘cause you like me / And you don’t like much and that’s okay / ‘Cause fat babies have no pride_

_-Lyle Lovette, “Fat Babies”_

* * *

Wanda had heard of the man called Loki, but meeting him was beyond words. His mind was chaotic at best. It was most like Stark’s mind, moving at a million miles an hour, yet unlike Stark’s mind it wasn’t moving in a fashion that was at all familiar or easily discern.

They say there was beauty in chaos, yet Wanda was unable to find it passed the beautiful face that was before her— even with the now red eyes there was no denying the man was gorgeous. Almost painfully so.

“Hello,” she cautiously greeted as the man sat down across the table.

He made eye contact with her and his mind cleared of the chaos and a single through flew through his mind: magic. Then the ache of regret, grief, loss, and depression hit her full force. She gripped the table, pitched forward, and gasped.

“Sorry,” the man quickly apologized. “I have been told I feel nothing less than full force.”

“That is correct,” she agreed. She closed her eyes and worked to close her mind— something she’d learned quickly while with HYDRA. Once she was alone in her mind, she straightened and gave him a small smile. “That is better. You wished to meet me, I believe?”

“Of course,” the man grinned, looking down at the food before him and not looking all that impressed.

Wanda, never having mastering cooking, generally took her meals in the cafeteria instead of using the state of art kitchen in her quarters. She did not spend much time in her quarters. She hated being alone.

He rested his head on a blue hand and Wanda stared.

“Your hand is blue.”

“Is it?” he asked, jerking and looking at his hand. “It seems to be blue, would you look at that?”

Wanda scowled.

“Yes, it’s blue. I have the power to shoot ice out of my limbs.”

“I thought you were human.”

“Are you not human?”

“I do not know what I am truly,” Wanda admitted. “I am something else.”

“True. You are enhanced. Or you might be Inhuman. Who knows?”

“And you know you are none of those things?”

“I was a half human-Frost Giant, but due to an event I’m sure you know all about, I lost the Frost Giant aspect of my physiology and became a mere mortal like the ones that populate this planet.”

Wanda nodded. Steve Rogers thought of the event many times since she’d joined the Avengers.

“Turns out my birth mother was one of those a race called the Kree experimented on,” he sighed, turning his hand around, then allowing it to join the other hand, weaving his fingers together and resting them on the table. “However, after being exposed to the mist that turns those with Kree DNA into Inhumans, I turned blue and shot ice out of my libs.”

“And your eyes turned red,” Wanda reminded him. “Does it affect your vision?”

“No. My eyes are simply a shade of red rather than something normal like blue or brown. I see no differently than I did before transmutation.”

“Intriguing,” Wanda murmured. “You wish to ask me something?”

“You did not see it when I saw down? I was thinking of it.”

“Your mind is utter chaos. If I tried, I’d be hard pressed to find what I was looking for. The only mind I’ve found as chaotic was Stark’s, but his fears were near the surface while he was near all the Chitari tech.”

“Understandable,” Loki agreed easily. “Are you aware of who the Winter Solider is?”

“An assassin used by HYDRA. They got him from the Russians. He was caught on camera when he attempted to take Nick Fury’s life. Upon discovering the Winter Solider’s true identity, Captain Rogers tried to jog his memory and since he vanished has been looking for him relentlessly,” Wanda rattled off. “Have you found him?”

“No. I accidentally lost him,” Loki lamented. “I sent him to take out a HYDRA base and he hasn’t been heard from in almost two months.”

Wanda frowned. “You’ve known where Sergeant Barnes was and you did not tell Captain Rogers?”

“No. Barnes wished not to be found. I provided what he wanted: missions to take out his oppressors. He did these for a year. He told me this would be his last one as he felt the need for revenge quenched. He then vanished.”

“He said he was done.”

“He had a home. He did not return to it.”

“Maybe he wished to start over.”

“Maybe, but he wouldn’t have used his passport knowing full well I would track him when he failed to check in.”

Wanda frowned. “He didn’t check in to you, though, did he?”

“No. He checked in with the woman he lived with.”

“Oh. How is she?”

“Worried,” Loki replied. “Anyway, the last place he used his passport, his only form of ID, was to check into a flight to San Francisco with a layover in Denver.”

“You and Captain Rogers are going and you wish for me to join you? Why?”

“I do not know your powers work,” Loki admitted grudgingly. “Would you be able to feel his mind?”

“I might be able to,” Wanda admitted. “I do not know him, though.”

“I understand. Would you be willing to try?”

Wanda sat up straighter. “Of course. Captain Rogers took my brother and I in after we’d tried to kill him and his comrades. I wish to aid him find his friend.”

A huge smile broke out across Loki’s face and even though she was actively working on blocking currently, she was hit with a huge wave of happiness and fondness. She rocked a little.

“You’re correct. You do not feel anything a little.”

“Sorry.”

He did not look sorry in the least.

* * *

_It’s a miracle that he survived / What are the chances that a man would be standn’ there and take him home to his wife_

_-Steve Martin & Edie Brickell, “Sarah Jane and the Iron Mountain Baby” _

* * *

“I am very pissed off at you.”

“I understand.”

“You’re selfish.”

“Yes. I’ve never denied that.”

“Steve is an idiot for taking you back without kicking your butt.”

“Would you like to do it for him?”

“Aw, hell no. I’m not kicking your butt now that you can freeze mine.”

“I have total control over my powers, Samuel.”

“I don’t care. You fight dirty! I ain’t ever getting in a fight with you willingly.”

“I will.”

Both men turned to find Natasha Romanov standing in the doorway of Sam’s living room. Sam didn’t bother to ask how she’d gotten there, even though he’d locked down his apartment when Loki arrived. Partly to prevent her from showing up to kick Loki’s butt.

Stupid, really. If she wanted in, she’d get in.

“Not here. Samuel is worried about the furniture. He’s rather fond of it.”

“I am,” Sam said, shrugging.

Natasha spared him a glance before closing the distance between herself and Loki and punching him in the nose. There was a loud crack and soon blood was dripping onto the white carpet.

“Aw, man! That’s what I was trying to prevent!” Sam squawked, running off to get some towels, carpet cleaner, and the first aid kit for Loki. By the time he returned Loki had moved himself to the kitchen and was bleeding over the sink and Natasha was nowhere to be found. “Here. Let’s set that nose so it’ll be straight.”

“Yes. I had a nose job recently. Best not mess it up.”

“What? Why’d you have a nose job?”

“I froze my nose off.”

“The whole thing?”

“Just the tip, but it was…uncomfortable until I had it fixed.”

“No duh,” Sam scoffed. “We’ll wait for the bleeding to let up. She really socked you.”

“I think it’s not solely due to my leaving Steven behind to fight HYDRA,” Loki quietly said. “What happened whilst I was away?”

“No idea, man. I was busy following dead ends on Bucky.”

“Sorry.”

“You were really good at covering his tracks.”

“He was better at it than I,” Loki smirked then cringed.

“Oh, this brings back memories,” Sam chuckled. “What is with you and getting punched by girls?”

“Women, Samuel. Very strong, independent women.”

“At least you’ve got at type,” Sam snickered. “So, I hear we’re going to San Fran via Denver. Mountain air and then some fog. And hills. Fog and hills.”

“I have a feeling you do not actually enjoy San Francisco,” Loki observed, checking to see if his nose had stopped gushing blood.

“Not really into California.”

“You can remain behind.”

“You know, I think I might. Nat might need help. I mean, if you don’t mind. I know finding the memory deprived Bucky has been my deal, but—”

“Samuel, we’re taking Wanda with us.”

“Ah, good. I think. Do you think she’ll be able to use her mind powers to find him?”

“That is the hope. We will see.”

“Well, call me if you need me.”

“We will. I doubt we will find him. He’s likely long gone. I am simply concerned as he’s not tried to contact Jessica.”

“He always does?”

“Yes. The longest he took was two weeks and that was when he was trying to shake you and Steven off his tail.”

“Oh! I remember that. Steve was an angry puppy for days. So close, yet so far.”

Loki nodded sadly.

“Okay, let’s set that nose.”

Sam worked on putting Loki’s nose back together (Natasha had made a mess, but not one Sam couldn’t fix) and spent time studying Loki’s red eyes.

“Creepy, correct?”

“No. Different is all.”

“Bad guys have red eyes. Red is evil.”

“Red is also the color of love,” Sam offered. “And the color Thor wears a lot. And the color of Christmas, America, Britain, a handful of other countries—”

“China. Russia.”

“Yeah, yeah.”

“Lord Voldemort had red eyes because he’d sunk too deep into the Dark Arts.”

“White rabbits have red eyes.”

“And they are very creepy.”

Sam rolled his eyes. “I bet Steve still likes them even though they’re red.”

“I’ve no idea his feelings on rabbit eyes.”

Sam groaned.

Loki’s mouth hitched up a little, but not far enough to pull on his tender nose.

“Okay. Go get cleaned up.”

Loki paused, looking as if he was going to apologize again.

“Just go, man. I get it. I am mad as hell at you, but I’ll get over it. But, you do it to him again I will cut you so bad you don’t know what cut you so bad.”

Sam waved a finger at Loki, who looked seldom, like the threat was real. Sam wasn’t sure if he was joking or not until after Loki left and Sam was busy trying to get the red blood out of his white carpet.

“Yeah. I meant it. Don’t want Nat ruining my carpet ever again,” Sam muttered.

* * *

_See the brightest ones of all / Early in October fall / That’s the way it goes, that’s the way / While the dark ones go to bed / With good whiskey in their head_

_-Gillian Welch, “That’s The Way”_


End file.
